Thursday, May 25, 2006

Plenary preparation & reporting

One of my biggest complaints over the past couple of years is the fact that there is little or not feedback to any one regarding Green Party Business: not to registered members of the GPCA, nor to party activists, nor to county councils, sometimes not even to members of the Cordinating Committee. There is no better way to make people turn off, decide that what they think and do has no influence, seek other outlets for their activism, than to treat their interest with such disdain.

Mike Feinstein and members of the IT Committee set up an experimental online discussion space for the plenary that did not happen. Since it is now rescheduled for late June, I hope that this feature is exercised to it's fullest.

This is a much more well organized and functional capability than the basic Plenary Packet links that currently exist on the GPCA site itself, where you can't even tell by the file name (1.pdf, 2.pdf, 3.pdf, etc.) what the various sections are supposed to include.

It is also a way in which those who will not be able to attend the plenary can make their opinions known now, before it becomes yet another chapter in the history of our dysfunction. (Apologies to Hank, there is a lot of good history that he has collected, but here is also dysfunction.)

So, here is one way for all of us to participate. It may be the most open state political meeting, if we make it so. If we do not make use of this, first to provide opinion to inform delegate voting, and then to report back on the voting, then we have missed a great opportunity to demonstrate what grassroots participation really means.

I suggest that every county council make an effort to notify the Greens in your county and allow all of us to become vitural members of a great grassroots assembly of Greens.

1 comment:

Okay, I took your advice and visited the experimental website; I had some kinks with my PW, but it must have been me, as the same user name and PW worked fine in the morning. In any case, I posted a comment on the change to the "Purpose" of the Greens (Bylaw Article 2), as you know, but hope your readers will go there and add to the discussion . . .